The coolest cars created by NASA

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

We all know that NASA creates the most advanced spaceships, shuttles, capsules and modules. They are incredible and bordering on fantasy. But few people know that the agency also creates cars. And they are just as great.

The history of cars created by order of NASA is striking in its diversity. Even more surprising is how little we know about these devices and how much they have influenced the automotive industry.

Astronaut Transfer Van

As if space flights weren't enough: many astronauts also rode the steep Astrovan. This vehicle has supported all NASA missions since STS-9. First, it taught astronauts to put on bulky spacesuits and operate complex mechanisms. Secondly, he effectively delivered the team to the shuttle and took them back.

A special air supply was carried out inside the car to make the training and stay of astronauts in the cabin more comfortable. Florida is a very humid state, so clean air was fed directly into the space suits of astronauts.

Mobile Quarantine Module (MQF)

The clean air supply system was implemented not only in the Astronaut Transfer Van. There was also a huge and shining MQF, the name of which can be translated as "mobile quarantine module". This is a capsule that housed 11 astronauts who returned from a historic space mission to the moon. What for? Good question.

At that time, it was believed that the team could bring some kind of space pathogens to Earth. Simply put, NASA feared that astronauts would infect us all with something unknown. Therefore, immediately after arrival, they were placed in such a cell. They stayed there for three weeks, blown by the clean earthly air. While the astronauts were bored in the module, President Nixon visited them. They were also transported from place to place in a special plane.

ER-2 Mobile Chase Car

The unique car looks like a cross between a racing car and a police car. However, this car has a special purpose. The air-to-ground radio communication is installed inside it, and in the cabin there is always, besides the driver, one more pilot. The task of this person is to drive strictly for the ER-2 capsule landing from space, establish communication with the astronaut inside and give him directions, orienting on the terrain. In this way, the vehicle helps the team make a successful landing.

Tracked conveyor

NASA has created two such transporters. Previously, rockets were assembled directly at the launch site, but later the agency decided to move production to premises, for example, at the Kennedy Space Center. Therefore, a mechanism was required that could transport huge structures like the Saturn V to launch sites. After the whole process was modernized and the tracked transporters lost their "duties", they were finalized and sent to help launch commercial ships into space, as well as create the SLS.

Evacuation vehicle

Flying into space is a dangerous business, so NASA calculated in advance even the worst scenarios for the development of events. If an unforeseen situation happened on the launch site, the astronauts and the support team would quickly leave the scene in M113, a reinforced SUV. Before that, the car was also used at combat points and more than once confirmed its reliability. Later, another modification of this car, even more resistant to explosions, was created - MRAP.

Aerodynamic truck

NASA seemed to be a little of all inventions, and it began developing an aerodynamic truck, seeking to reduce the aerodynamic drag of such cars. True, some of them looked like they were created specifically for the movie "Mad Max". Others surprised with their design.

For example, one of these trucks had an elongated rear, shaped like a boat. And on the hull there were strips of felt, which served as indicators of the direction and strength of the wind flowing around the truck.

Personnel transport vehicles

When the Space Shuttle returned to Earth, NASA used a kind of lounge car that took the team of astronauts right from the cockpit, all at once. He transported them not just from point A to point B, but straight to the second floor of one of the agency's buildings.

These cars are still in use today, for example at the Washington airport.

Robot car

The small module has become a high-profile event this year. Four independent wheels, each driven by a separate electric motor, while the entire vehicle is electronically controlled. In this case, the robot can travel on business itself or be controlled by a pilot. He became an intermediate link on the way to create a rover with similar operating principles.